As it happened: NHS England under extreme pressure, says NHS chief

Doctors’ leaders say the “patchy supply” of vaccine to GP surgeries across Scotland is hampering the speed of delivery to patients.

Ministers have pledged a first dose of the vaccine to 1.4 million of the most vulnerable Scots by mid-February.

But the British Medical Association in Scotland says inconsistencies in supply make it difficult to plan patient appointments – and some GP surgeries have yet to receive any vaccine at all.

Dr Andrew Buist, who chairs the British Medical Association’s GP committee in Scotland, says so far “good progress” has been made in giving it to priority groups such as care home residents and front-line health staff.

But he tells the BBC’s Politics Scotland programme: “The current problem lies with the next priority group, which is the 80-plus group, which GPs in Scotland are set to vaccinate because the supply of the vaccine so far has been quite patchy.

“Some practices have a good supply, some have had none so far.”

He says his practice has received 100 doses of the vaccine for 600 patients over the age of 80, who all need to be vaccinated by 5 February.

“We don’t want to send out appointments to patients until we know that we can definitively vaccinate them, otherwise patients get very upset.”

Health Secretary Jeane Freeman has pledged the workforce and infrastructure will be in place to vaccinate 400,000 people each week by the end of February.

Meanwhile no new Covid-related deaths have been reported in Scotland today and while 1,341 new cases of Covid-19 have been reported, that is the lowest daily figure since 28 December.

Read more.